'ISIS Beatle member' jailed for eight years in knicker-smuggling terror case

A West London man alleged to be the fourth ISIS 'Beatle' member has been sentenced to eight years in prison for carrying a weapon for terrorist purposes.

Former drug dealer Aine Davis pleaded guilty last month to funding terrorism by persuading his hairdresser wife Amal El-Wahabi to try and smuggle 20,000 euros to him in Syria, using a friend, Nawal Masaad, as a courier who hid the money in her knickers. He also pleaded guilty to possessing a firearm for terrorist purposes after posing with a Kalashnikov assault rifle alongside other fighters in a picture he sent to his wife in Britain. The sentence was made up of six years for the firearms charge and two years for the fundraising charge - both of which are offences under the Terrorism Act.

Davis was deported from Turkey last August after serving a seven-and-a-half-year sentence for membership in the so-called Islamic State. On his arrival at Luton airport, he was detained by British counter-terrorism police and charged with the three offences. After an Old Bailey trial in 2014, El-Wahabi became the first person to be found guilty of funding terrorism in Syria and jailed for 28 months, while Ms Masaad was cleared of wrongdoing.

Court artist sketch by Elizabeth Cook of Aine Davis at Westminster Magistrates' Court (PA Archive)

Judge Mark Lucraft KC says he believes Davis was in Syria in late 2013 and early 2014 "not for lawful purposes" and said videos and other material found on Davis's wife's phone showed Davis's "commitment to the terrorist cause." He continued: "Photographs and messages found on the phones clearly show you in possession of a firearm and as part of an extremist group and concerned in terrorist activity."

Davis is allegedly the only member of the so-called Death Squad 'Beatles' group to face charges in Britain, but he has continued to deny being a member of the group and the allegations did not feature in the charges against him. Davis had a number of drug convictions in early adulthood and he was jailed in 2004 for possessing a firearm. He became a Muslim and sometimes adopted the name Hamza, the court heard.

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The British militants became infamous for holding around two dozen Westerners a decade ago — when the so-called Islamic State controlled a large swath of Syria and Iraq. Several of the captives were killed in gruesome beheadings that were broadcast online, including Britons David Haines and Alan Henning. The militants were given the nickname derived from the famous band, by their captives because of their British accents. Davis was arrested in Turkey in 2015 and convicted in 2017 of belonging to the Islamic State group — it was during his trial there that he denied being one of 'The Beatles'. The group’s four alleged members knew one another in West London before travelling to the Middle East and joining the caliphate. Mohammed Emwazi, who carried out the executions and was nicknamed 'Jihadi John', was killed in a drone strike in 2015.

Aine Davis, front kneeling, is a London-born drug dealer who allegedly went to Syria to fight (PA)

Two others, Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh, were captured by US-backed Kurdish forces in 2018 and are imprisoned in the US. Kotey has been given a life sentence and Elsheikh is expected to get life when he is formally sentenced later this month. US prosecutors said Davis travelled to Syria with Kotey and he admitted in a Turkish court that he knew Emwazi from a mosque in West London. Kotey also told interrogators in the US that although Davis visited his house for lunch while in Syria, he had no direct involvement in the hostage-keeping operation. At one point Davis was suspected by the intelligence agencies in the UK and the US of himself being a member of the 'Beatles' but that is longer believed to be the case.

Nick Price, from the Crown Prosecution Service, said: "Davis left the UK and travelled to Syria to involve himself with a proscribed terrorist organisation. While in Syria, he was able to call upon an associate or a network of like-minded individuals to arrange and deliver 20,000 euros to his wife, which was due to be taken to the country. It is only right he has been convicted and imprisoned in this country."